The Lego & the Nation

It all starts in a pretty way – your Son demanding to have the Lego set & an indulging parent that you are, you complying with it. Pretty, simple! What’s the risk? It’s expensive, but when the credit card is there, the interest & the premium will pain you later. It is creative nonetheless & in the ways of amateurs, visionary too.

The promise of your Son, doing magic with the Lego is intoxicating, your dreams, far surpassing the child’s imagination. The child has already showed you the Lego Transform-ers and you believe in him. The Lego, your Son, the Transform-ers – Time meets Einstein meet Universe.

All so grand, all so good, all so euphoric, all so cute. Just that your child is called Modi…The Lego is unboxed in no time amidst the claps of the proud you & the child sets to work. You expect nothing less than Ram Setu really? The red pieces for economy, the greens for polity, the yellows, your favorite for sense & the blues for the society. The creator & the pieces get to work diligently. Night & day, day & night, the boy is at it and you can never get over the joy of his sheer dedication, his single-point calling in life. Destruction being the Papa of creation belief at heart, the child makes & breaks the brochure structures like Planning Commission in an arrogance of the one truly gifted. All too good, all so unique! Your boundless bundle of irrational exuberance! The red figurine toppled there, the orange figurine installed here, the GST blocks moving like Rubik’s cube that you have zero know-how of, the belief that the boys knows it all. The demonetization structure looks twisted, and your stretched out rationality is curbed because the Ram statue is grandiose. It’s your child after all, keep clapping on. & he has a partner in crime/play, the BFF all kids must have, the affable bully next door. The two of them together, the bulldozer & the architect, move the pieces with the zeal of a bull in a china shop and you, face painted in the tri-colour of nationalism, patriotism & religious fervor look-on, cheer-on.

Journalist Don't wait for Middle-class awakening

Were the prime time ever like this? Forget the entertainment, the discussions, the deliberations, the theories of conspiracies & the opinions? AIR was dull & aptly forgotten, DD a distant memory of avuncular anchors & instant fashion – PrimeTime was begotten by a lad called Shohaib Illaisi & for a time India’s Most Wanted may have held as much sway over popular imagination as Alif Laila!

This was followed by a forgettable innings of Star-NDTV alliance, forgettable in impact but a consummation that gave birth to the modern day journalist (by definition of modern day journalism).

Deed done, it was time for Renaissance, & a young Rajat Sharma gave use those 1^st glimpses of today’s media courtrooms with Aap ki Adalat – the tonality was witty yet the seeds of ridicule were sown back then. Gradually as Aliens abducted cows & Gods developed a fancy for appetite of common man’s food, News Prime Time actively competed with scheming MILs & docile DILs.

& there was nothing wrong with this narrative, why can news not be entertainment, why can truth not be unbelievable or frivolous or yes even be doubtful? It was entertainment – we really did not need issues – who really wants to know about displaced cultures for which NBA strived, who really cared about Dalits & Adivaasis? A growing nation needs not issues but solutions and a guilt-free conscience for indulgence. & we did cry & made candles in an electrified India an item of activism – Uphaar happened & so did Bil Clinton’s visit!

So far, all good – a frivolous race living in with an uprooted media. & then somewhere the Nation realized it needed to know…Know not as knowledge but know as a means to realise its middle class nationalistic aspirations. News began a transformation in the age of Social Media – entertainment was pushed to segments, action packed entertainment started dominating the narrative. The Angry Young Man of 70’s cinema was taking over News & the cynical among us watched in amusement as we were taken over, pushed to minority, labeled (along with family & friends) anti-nationals & then strategically silenced. Today, a Ravish can blame the social media, other media, we the people, but what did he do or a Barkha or Rajdeep did? Today, the only reason the majority follows them is for the abuses, or some like us, who saw through this transformation without ever realizing it.

We are protesting over dead bodies now, protest a skill that we have so well mastered, an act we specialize in without any results. We were cynics then, hopeless now. We have done everything but make one sustained resolution to put a stop to this demonization of media. News are getting louder by the day, yet the silence of press is deafening.

A journalist was a clown when she/he reported on Ravan’s lost airport with c-grade vfx, yet a clown that was harmless. Today, your community has lost its public respect. You lost values then & the innocuous looking frivolity has come back to haunt you today. The brave among you are dying & condolences are looking hollower by the day. The celebration over their passing is more frenzied, more evoking than the muted speeches in Delhi!

Why is the journalist feeling weak when her strength has the potential to transform opinions so superfluously formed over bare propaganda. Gauri Lankesh was not the 1^st, she won’t be the last & she knew this. She still chose her path, her destiny was for a cause, do not defeat it by your silence.

You may be a few, mostly unheard warriors, some troll-abused, but march on. Don’t wait for a middle-class awakening. You made them such, you lost your respect, now regain it. The responsibility lies with you! 

किसान की नीलामी

नहीं पता सरकार किसकी है
नहीं पता दरकार किसकी है
सत्य तो वो है जो कल गुज़र गया
इस रफ़्तार से रूठ ठहर गया
आज अखबार की खबर
कल फिर चल पड़ेगा ये शहर
शव को तौला हमने उसकी सोने की तराज़ू में
इंसानियत नीलाम की चंद मौहरों में
उसकी लाश पर बनेगा एक कारखाना
बनेगी स्टील बढेगा देश का खजाना
कल भूल चलेंगे उसके आँसूं हमसब
किसी सीमेंट के बगीचे में गयी है इंसानियत थम
खेत भूल गए खो गयी मिट्टी की मादक महक
किसी गुमनाम शमशान में जल रही है इंसानियत दहक दहक
उद्योग तुम्हारा शहर तुम्हारा
उजर गया गुलिस्तां हमारा
सोने की लंका आज फिर रची है
अशोक वाटिका आज फिर सजी है
क्या कलियुग में रावण करेगा रणविजय
राम की जयकार भूल कर जीतेगा भय
सुदामा क्या दरिद्र रहेगा
क्या गंगा में लहू बहेगा
किसी की ताकत बनी है धन
और कइयों को बनाया इसने निर्धन
जिस किसान के पास था हल
आज बना वो लाचार निर्बल
क्या आज फिर चुप बैठेगा इंसान
एक बार फिर मजबूर मरेगा कोई किसान
लाशों के पहाड़ पर तिरंगे की शान
यही बन गया है क्या हिन्दुस्तान।

एक किसान की मौत

आज एक किसान की मौत का नज़ारा
देखा हिंदुस्तान ने
कौन था वो, किसको पता
किस गम में था वो बेचारा
जो खेत छोड़ शहर वो आया
जो हल चलाने वाले हाथ थे
क्यों बना बैठे फांसी का फंदा
कौन था उस भीड़ में ज़िंदा
कुछ बोलने वाले कुछ मौन धारी मुर्दा
किसकी ज़मीन, किसके मकान
किस दाम में बिकेगा आसमान
किस शहर में बसेगा हिंदुस्तान
आज फिर मर गया एक किसान
उसे बचाने वाला,
न था कोई इंसान
न कोई भगवान
जिया बेनाम, मारा अनजान
सूनी शमशान में एक और मेहमान
क्यों है मेरा भारत महान

Why should the minorities not fear?

Codified books have been a bane of religion – X,Y,Z (feel free to assign names). Thankfully for the ones that are still in their adolescence, they have to contend with just ONE. For the others who have seen through the days of unwritten text, have to content with as many texts as the number of gods.

The spirit of competition is good – it led to the discovery of the Americas and eventually Coca Cola. However competing religions are a bad press. When the guy dressed in robe preaches cosmic difference between believers & non-believers and a similarly vain dude goes bullshitting around with cow dung, it becomes nothing more than a clown show.

Allowing practitioners of another faith/god/opinion/ideology to co-exist with you is not tolerance; it is basic tenet of humanity.  

The case relating to Staines murder and the subsequent Wadhwa commission findings has a universal legal adage to it – innocent till proven guilty and for all the wrong reasons has allowed many a inglorious to roam free. On the role of Bajrang Dal’s involvement, the findings was quite clear and contrary to the advise of its counsel as well as the investigation team (http://www.frontline.in/static/html/fl2021/stories/20031024003902400.htm).  However beyond the legal boundaries, lies a society that cares for it little less than going beyond the 2^nd line of a headline. This is the group that believes Modi did it the right way in Gujarat, that RSS had a hero in Godse, that Dara Singh was eponymous to his name. Religious tolerance, well that’s what gets thrown out while flying in the Puspak. Philosophies are better practiced than just remain in glorious textbooks.

Minorities have as much right to feel frightened as the majority has the right to feel threatened. Claiming a dalit as your own and then denying him the right to enter your sacred temples is what Mallya did by charging you to book a Kingfisher flight and never really taking off. Worse still, you are not served beef on board. 

Christian missionaries have for long carried the white man’s burden, the Islamist literature has for long spawned a group of fanatic zealots, but definitely when the mantle of upholding the national pride falls on to names like Godse and Dara Singh, there is a serious flaw in the conditioning of the modern Hindu. Nothing escapes a black hole, not light, not even our or their gods. All that enters becomes the same, a black hole. For the sake of argument, Holocaust may never happen again, hopefully the fear is uncalled for, but then some of us feel on the surface that it is time for the other party to be taught a lesson. Tolerance, that’s for the secular freak.

If churches are vandalized, so be it. If massive public ‘ghar-wapsi’ ceremonies are held, so be it. Even temples have reported increased cases of theft. Why feel the fear?

What New Year Resolution do we want?

Midnight of 31st, the compulsory wishes flow, it may be symbolic, but as along as there is a warmth in winter who will complain? Of the messages I got today, one series in particular interested me - HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015 written with 'Hindu' inscribed in the letters.

Are we heralding a 'Hindu New Year', the question I ask myself and how will it define what future we are shaping for our nation? While a section of our society plans a movement from 'Hindi, Muslim, Skih, Isaai, aapas mein sab bhai bhai' to 'Gharwapsi' and from celebrating 'Gandhi Jayanti' to 'Godse Jayanti', what is expected of the others? Who are these others who are re-writing Mythology as History? What are their numbers? To what level of intolerance will they go? & more pertinently, how many of us will adhere to these views or dangerously still be blind to this transition in our society?

2014 was the year we saw a massive mandate in the name of 'Achhe Din' but this was also the year where fundamentalist Hindutva came out of with a full-fledged Bhagwa drive to saffronise not only our policies, but also our history and thought. The government of the day has been a mute spectator to this undercurrent that is assuming the shape of a wave which will define this nation for the years to come. Appeasement was bad, but Hatred would be destructive. And in the process of this intolerant Hinduisation, we may just be breaking the basic fabrics on which this religion has stood to the glory which the nationalists tend to infuse us with.

Will the tolerant Hindu be able to withstand this militant thought that threatens to destroy it or will mark the advent of the militant Hindu? Exaggeration in celluloid is entertainment, in reality, it assumes the shape of a dangerous propaganda. Reducing all the 4-5 centuries of Mughal rule with a single word 'invaders' is not the correct route. All it takes is a single drop of poison to make the entire glass of water poisonous. The venom in our thought we are sowing today will one day become a hydra that will swallow us with a disdain it reserves for the races doomed in their pride.   

Who Am I?

Who am I?

Born in bones,

A nameless soul,

A ray of hope,

Unknown to gods,

From the seed that was sown.

A Muslim, a Hindu,

Or destiny’s child,

With no surname,

With none of blame,

Cry is my Joy,

Awake in my dreams, ignorant of the blind.

You call me,

Give me a name,

I only smile,

I cry in futile,

Untouched by religion,

Immune to hatred, absolved of your shame.